ထမင်း
hta.mang:/tʰəmɪ́ɴ/
In Burmese, the English word 'rice' is expressed using ထမင်း (hta.mang:). Wiktionary also lists ဆန် (hcan).
Meaning: seeds used as food (noun)
Ways to say it
| Burmese | Romanization (Wiktionary) | IPA |
|---|---|---|
| ထမင်း | hta.mang: | /tʰəmɪ́ɴ/ |
| ဆန် | hcan | /sʰàɴ/ |
The word ထမင်း specifically refers to rice that has been cooked and is ready to eat. In Burmese, the word for 'rice' (ထမင်း) is often used metonymically to mean 'a meal' in general.
How do you pronounce it?
hta.mang:
Did you know?
- In Burmese, the word for 'rice' is so central to the culture that asking ထမင်းစားပြီးပြီလား ('Have you eaten rice?') is a common way to say 'Hello' or 'How are you?'
- Because ထမင်း represents the essence of a meal, the act of 'eating rice' is often used as a synonym for 'surviving' or 'earning a living'.
- The Burmese word ဆန် is compared by linguists to the Old Chinese word 粲, which specifically referred to polished white rice.
Examples in context
- ထမင်း နှစ်လုပ်Two mouthfuls of riceThis example shows how to refer to the amount of cooked rice using ထမင်း.
- ထမင်းစားပြီးပြီလား။htamin sar pee bee lar?Have you eaten rice?
- ထမင်းအရမ်းကောင်းတယ်။htamin ayan kaung tal.The rice is very good.
Example conversation
Aung Aung and Khine Khine are preparing for lunch.
- အောင်အောင် Aung Aungခိုင်ခိုင် ထမင်း ချက်ပြီးပြီလား။Khine Khine htamin chet pyee pyee lar?Khine Khine, have you cooked the rice?
- ခိုင်ခိုင် Khine Khineဟုတ်ကဲ့ ချက်ပြီးပါပြီ။hot ke chet pyee par pyee.Yes, it's already cooked.
- အောင်အောင် Aung Aungထမင်း စားကြရအောင်။htamin sar kya ya aung.Let's eat rice.
- ခိုင်ခိုင် Khine Khineဟုတ်ကဲ့ စားကြမယ်။hot ke sar kya mae.Yes, let's eat.
Sources
- Wiktionary, “rice” translations and entries ထမင်း, ဆန်, CC BY-SA 4.0, dump of 2026-09-26.
- Word origins: Wiktionary entries ဆန်, CC BY-SA 4.0.
- Example sentences: Wiktionary CC BY-SA 4.0.
